BUFFY-COAT-DERIVED PLATELET CONCENTRATES - SWEDISH EXPERIENCE

The need for source material for plasma products such as factor Vm pre parations and improving the quality of red cells for transfusion becam e determining factors in the choice of methods for blood components in the 1970s and 1980s in Sweden. The possibility to make platelet conce ntrates (PC) from buffy coats (BC-PC) instead of from platelet-rich pl asma (PRP-PC), as first described in England and The Netherlands, usin g an additive solution as the major component of the platelet storage medium, as first described by Rock et al.,(1) has been shown to influe nce favourably the national supply of blood components and has become accepted as the normal standard procedure in the first half of the 199 0s. Leucocyte-depleted PCs, produced from pools of 4-6 BCs, used in al l multiple platelet transfusions to thrombocytopenic patients, have st rongly reduced the demand for HLA compatible PCs. Nationwide, 79% of t he demand of PCs is supplied as BC-PCs, mostly leuco-depleted which, s o far, have compared favourably with apheresis-PCs for cost-effectiven ess. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.